LeftWatch

12/03/2009

Poverty was growing BEFORE the recession struck

"Levels of poverty, unemployment and repossessions have all been on the rise since 2004, a report reveals. An audit carried out by social research charity, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, says the country needs to recover from "deep-seated" problems which were emerging before the economic downturn. The foundation's data analysis found that 2004-05 marked a "key turning point", with poverty, unemployment and repossessions on the increase. Poverty is at the same level as it was in 2000, with two million children in low-income households, unemployment at a 12-year high and repossessions at six times the level of 2004, the report says. Julia Unwin, the foundation's chief executive, said: "The report highlights the scale of the challenge the Government faces if it is to reduce poverty significantly in Britain." The study calls in to question the Government's record on tackling poverty." - Independent

Posted at 07:25 AM in Labour failure | Permalink | Comments (0)

"Police not spending any more time on the beat, says watchdog"

"Police officers are spending no more time on the beat now than they were two years ago, despite a series of initiatives intended to get them out of stations, the Government’s adviser on cutting red tape said yesterday. Jan Berry undermined the introduction of a Home Office White Paper on the future of policing by highlighting continuing problems with attempts to cut red tape and make efficiency savings. As the Government announced proposals to overhaul policing, including standard uniforms across England and Wales and officers patrolling alone in town centres, Ms Berry pointed to problems with Home Office efforts to change working practices. Many of the 27,000 portable hand-held computers given to officers in an attempt to keep them away from their desks are ineffective because they lack the right programs, she said." - The Times

Posted at 07:15 AM in Labour failure | Permalink | Comments (1)

The decline in manufacturing has been greater under Brown-Blair than Thatcher-Major

"The importance of manufacturing to the economy declined more rapidly under Labour administrations since 1997 than it did during the Margaret Thatcher era, according to a Financial Times study. The big winners in the same period were bankers, estate agents and public sector workers, whose share of output increased under the Labour governments of Tony Blair, the former prime minister, and Gordon Brown, his successor. The findings about the state of the economy were uncovered during a study of data held by the Office for National Statistics."

The full Financial Times report is here.

Douglas Carswell MP thinks he knows the explanation: regulation and taxation.

Posted at 06:48 AM in Labour failure | Permalink | Comments (0)

12/02/2009

Brown urged to apologise for saying Spain is member of G20

At PMQs earlier, Mr Cameron asked the Prime Minister to admit that Britain was the last nation in the G20 to still be in recession. Mr Brown replied that Spain was in the G20 and was also in recession. Unfortunately for Mr Brown, Spain isn't in the G20.

The Shadow Chief Secretary of the Treasury Philip Hammond has now written to the Prime Minister urging him to apologise:

“Today when faced with a simple and direct question, you chose to mislead the House of Commons by stating that Spain is in the G20. This is simply not true. While Spain has attended recent G20 meetings, it is not a member of the Group. Indeed, you explicitly admitted in a press conference last year that: ‘Spain is not a member of the G20’ (16 October 2008). On Monday, David Cameron took the opportunity on the floor of the House to correct a factual inaccuracy from the previous Question Time. I trust that you too will take the earliest opportunity on the floor of the House to apologise and amend the record. I would also be grateful if you could confirm that, contrary to your assertions today, the United Kingdom will be the last country in the G20 to exit recession.”

5.30pm: Guido's video comment on Brown's latest porky pie:

Posted at 04:06 PM in Dirty Tricks Labour, Gordon Brown, Video | Permalink | Comments (27)

Twenty-five taxpayer-funded groups that should lose their welfare cheques

By Matt Sinclair of The TaxPayers' Alliance.

Yesterday, LeftWatch followed up on its attack on the taxpayer-funded Family and Parenting Institute's intervention in the political debate over whether marriage should be recognised in the tax system. Ed West, at the Telegraph, has argued that taxpayer funded campaigning 'charities' should have their funding cut. The new blog asked "What other taxpayer funded charities should lose their welfare cheques?"

Happily, I can report that we've produced a detailed report on this issue at the TaxPayers' Alliance, Taxpayer funded lobbying and political campaigning (PDF), which contains a nice big list of taxpayer funded campaigns to cut. That report argued that, as well as introducing a law emulating the American restriction on the use of taxpayers' money to hire lobbyists, the Conservatives should cut funding from the following groups, which are primarily political campaigns or pressure groups:

Trade associations

The Local Government Association - £14.8 million
The NHS Confederation - £7.0 million
The Association of Police Authorities - £1.4 million

(These groups do some actual work for the public sector so the figures above are only the membership subscription fees from public sector organisations paying for representation).

Continue reading "Twenty-five taxpayer-funded groups that should lose their welfare cheques" »

Posted at 02:51 PM in Politicised charities | Permalink | Comments (13)

12/01/2009

We need a list of taxpayer-funded charities that should lose their welfare cheques

On LeftWatch's first day we highlighted the government connections of Katherine Rake, who attacked Tory family policy on Radio 4 yesterday and was presented to the nation without reference to those connections.

Today's Daily Mail opened fire on Ms Rake in a typical all-guns-blazing-way.

Over at The Telegraph Ed West comments on LeftWatch and calls for the Conservatives to dismantle "taxpayer-funded 'charities'".

These charities will, James Forsyth predicted, be in the frontline of the battle against any Conservative government. Labour may lose elected office next May but they'll stay in power throughout the quangocracy and appointment-land. One of the first acts of any Tory government should be to end government funding of all charities with a political agenda. Stonewall, for example, should lose its money. Ben Summerskill's political ranting against the Conservatives shouldn't continue at all our expense.

Conservatives should protect themselves from accusations of being anti-gay or whatever other charge will be thrown by these state dependents by channeling 50% of the saved money to genuinely good causes in that same field of work. The Family and Parenting Institute's funding can go to local community groups working with families in the inner cities, for example. The other 50% can make a contribution to repaying Brown's debt.

What other taxpayer funded charities should lose their welfare cheques?

Posted at 05:51 PM in Politicised charities | Permalink | Comments (48)

11/30/2009

Welcome to LeftWatch

Although LeftWatch will look at the SNP, Greens, Liberal Democrats and other left-leaning movements we are most interested in the Labour Party.

I suggest the following trends within Labour should be our focus...

This is evident in, for example, the retirement of nearly all the leading Blairite MPs, Harriet Harman's equality agenda and Gordon Brown's embrace of the impractical, job-destroying Tobin tax.

Labour's reckless spending is their last throw of the dice. The spending buys them some extra votes, they hope, but certainly adds to the awful inheritance for the Conservatives if it doesn't. Peter Oborne has written a great article on this phenomenon.

Not unrelated to the previous category but please help us compile examples of wasteful Labour. Grant Shapps MP exposed Labour's £30,000 champagne bill this morning. The bubbly was, of course, all bought at your expense. And there there are the big examples of massive waste.

I recently wrote about the increasing nastiness of Labour's campaigning. The McBride emails. The smearing of Michael Kaminski by David Miliband. Harriet Harman's attempts to bracket the Tories and the BNP. ConHome regular Mark Fulford is working on a list of Labour's biggest lies.

There is also the huge issue of the appointees that Labour will leave behind in the quangocracy and appointment-land more generally. Dennis Sewell has written a brilliant cover piece for The Spectator on this subject. Even if Labour lose the next election, much of the British state will still be stuffed with left-leaning appointees, like Katherine Rake.

Are these the best categories?

This site is an experiment. Jonathan Isaby and I don't have the time to run another blog so this will only work if you feed us content.

Email me if you can help.

Posted at 04:19 PM in Dirty Tricks Labour, Lurching Left, Politicised charities, Scorched earth, Waste, waste and waste | Permalink | Comments (17)

Who was that woman attacking Tory policy on marriage this morning?

At 0853am this morning the Today programme interviewed Katherine Rake of the Family and Parenting Institute. She used her three minute twenty second slot to attack the Tory idea that marriage should be recognised by the tax system. She avoided a question about the evidence that shows marriage is much more stable than cohabitation and continued her political talking points.

She was presented as an independent expert on family policy but who is she and what is the Family and Parenting institute?

Katherine Rake was until recently a very regular contributor to The Guardian and ran the Fawcett Society. In a profile to mark her departure from seven years of running the Fawcett Society, she was described by The Guardian as "Feminism's calm champion".

The Family and Parenting Institute is nearly entirely funded by the taxpayer. In 2008/9 £9.5m of the Institute's income of £11.8m came from the Department of Children, Schools and Families via the Parenting Fund.

When the media has people like Ms Rake on to bash Tory policy on the family or ex-Labour man Ben Summerskill, now of the government-funded Stonewall lobby group, to bash the Tories on gay equality we should know a lot more about their background.

So many organisations dependent upon government money are run by people who please the government.

5.45pm: I'm grateful to Mark Clarke in the comments for pointing out that Fiona Millar - Alastair Campbell's partner - chairs the Family and Parenting Institute.

Posted at 03:15 PM in Politicised charities | Permalink | Comments (33)

11/29/2009

Can we believe what the Prime Minister says?

David Cameron taunts Gordon Brown after he abandoned plans for a honeymoon election. In this video from October 2007 the Tory leader says Mr Brown is the first Prime Minister in history to have flunked an election because he thought he could win it.

Posted at 03:18 PM in David Cameron, Gordon Brown, Video | Permalink | Comments (1)